A/N: Woo, final chapter, yay! First off, I wanna say THANK YOU to all the folks who reviewed – you guys are great! And second, I wanna show you a little picture I drew to go with this story. Let's hope the link works… It's a picture of Reishi. The head is too big and the shading is funky, but it's still okay. Give you something to look at anyways… Please review! Substitute the crap in parentheses as the proper punctuation marks, and don't keep the spaces.

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17. Final Celebration – A True Happy Ending

Three days had passed since the ordeal of the End of the World. Jiusenki had been sent to purgatory where he belonged and Reishi had gone back to Makai to try and find any more surviving members of her race. She had completed what she wanted to do – get revenge on the dragon that had killed her family – so now she was content to search the vast underworld of apparitions. Koto had gone back to the Makai as well, and everyone else had returned to the Human World.

The Ningenkai seemed totally unaware that their souls had all just been held captive inside of a large, ugly bird and that a crazy, evil dragon demon had just tried to take over the Earth. The humans all went about their daily business as if nothing had happened – the adults all went to their jobs in their suits, ties, and skirts, the kids all went to school, and the younger children played outside in their backyards, carefree and oblivious to the other two worlds that existed.

The only people who seemed to remember what had happened over the past few days were Kuwabara, Yusuke, Botan, Koenma, and Hiei. Kurama had not yet woken up from his coma, so nobody could know what he was thinking. His body was resting at his house in town; Shiori was away on a business trip and therefore had no idea that her son had not been conscious in over seventy-two hours.

Kurama was still breathing, so he was alive, the group could tell, but for how long would Kurama remain in this floating state? – caught between sleep and conscious life. There was always someone at his bedside, keeping a constant vigil in case he should wake up. Usually it was Hiei, who had spent the last three sleepless nights watching over the fox demon. He was grateful that Kurama had sacrificed his life for him, but he was also embarrassed. Occasionally, he even felt angry that Kurama had saved him, like the previous night…

"You stupid kitsune!" Hiei had growled as he stood alone with Kurama in his bedroom late that night. "You shouldn't have saved me! You should've just let me die!"

In his anger, Hiei had hurled several of Kurama's school textbooks across the room. He didn't care if he broke anything; he was sure Kurama would never wake up to notice. He even grabbed the front of Kurama's T-shirt and shook him vigorously, yelling at him. "Why didn't you just let me die?"

At last, it was morning, and Hiei had fallen asleep with his face stuck to a few loose sheets of paper on Kurama's desk. The sun streamed in through the windows, piercing the darkness of night and waking up the fire demon. He opened his scarlet eyes and moaned, still sleepy from being up so late the night before. He immediately looked over at Kurama, as if expecting to see him sitting up in bed, his bright green eyes staring at him and smiling, but he was immediately disappointed.

Kurama was still unconscious, just lying motionless on the sheets of his bed. His position hadn't moved in the past three days, and Hiei was losing hope as fast as the fine grains of salt slip through an hourglass. The fire demon sighed, staring at Kurama and glaring angrily at him. "Stupid… stupid fox," he mumbled softly, shaking his head.

"Hiei…"

Hiei stopped shaking his head and snapped his face up. He thought he heard Kurama's voice… No, he told himself firmly, forcing his head back down to glare at the floor. Kurama did not speak to you, and he never will because he's dead! Dead because he gave up his life for me… someone who surely did not deserve it…

"Hiei…" the voice croaked out again. Hiei couldn't help himself from tentatively looking back up again, but he knew that he was only deluding himself. Finally, his gaze on Kurama lingered long enough to see the fox's eyes open slowly, the emerald green gems dancing brightly in the pale morning light.

Kurama tried to speak again, but Hiei jumped to his side and gave him a look that said, "Don't waste your breath, kitsune." Kurama couldn't help but smile at Hiei's own special way of caring for someone. Hiei returned Kurama's smile with a glare and a traditional, "welcome-back-to-life" "Hn."

That night, there was a party to celebrate Kurama returning to the conscious world. The whole Reikai Tantei was invited, and they threw a riotous party. Food and balloons were everywhere, and the whole group was just so happy to see Kurama alive again. They had filled him in on all the events that had happened – Hiei constantly having to correct Kuwabara on some of his over-exaggerated facts.

"And then, this big giant snake came outta nowhere and started to rip Hiei's head off!" Kuwabara exclaimed, using his hands to illustrate his statement. Kurama chuckled, but Hiei shot him a death glare.

"I guess having the two of you be the last two men on earth still didn't make your friendship any closer," Kurama said with a smile. Hiei rolled his eyes and folded his arms, choosing not to reply to Kurama's facetiousness.

Botan summed up what the whole party was all about as the Tantei started to leave towards two o'clock in the morning. Patting Kurama's shoulder, she whispered in his ear, "We're glad to have you back, Kurama."

Too exhausted to clean up after the celebration, Kurama had sank into bed, brushing his hair aside with a happy, but tired sigh. Hiei had stuck around after everyone had left, wanting to thank the kitsune for saving his life in private. He, of course, wouldn't do such a thing in front of everyone else, so he had to wait until they had all left.

Finally, as Kurama was about to tell Hiei to go home and sleep, the fire demon spoke up.

"Kurama," he grunted, avoiding the kitsune's eyes.

"Yes, Hiei?" Kurama asked.

"I… I'm glad you sacrificed your life energy for me," Hiei mumbled, his tongue tripping over the words of gratitude. "Thanks."

Kurama smiled, his gaze lingering on Hiei for a moment, then turning to the half-open window to the stars outside. The night sky was a beautiful pitch black, the moon a magnificent crescent shape. The stars reminded the kitsune of Hiei, or rather, Hiei's eyes, which were twin pools of sparkling scarlet – like a supernova. Finally, Kurama looked away from the stars and replied:

"I only did what I thought was right, Hiei. After all, I wouldn't want you to die until the world ends."

--crazykitsune17--